6. Glossary Terms

Here are some definitions of the specific terms used in the PyMoDAQ documentation:

Actuator: Any instrument with a controllable varying parameter
conda: conda is part of the Miniconda distribution, that is recommended as part of PyMoDAQ installation. In the PyMoDAQ project, conda is exclusively used as a Python environment manager. It is not used as a package manager, so the command conda install … will not be used. We will rather use pip as a package manager.
Control Modules: GUI for actuators and detectors, with subsequent classes: DAQ_Move and DAQ_Viewer, see Control Modules
DashBoard: GUI allowing configuration and loading of a preset file of actuators and detectors. You can also start extensions from its GUI such as the DAQ Scan, DAQ Logger, … See the Dashboard section of the documentation.
DataDim: Enum for the dimensionality representation of the data object, for instance scalars have a dimensionality Data0D, waveforms or vectors have Data1D dimensionality, camera’s data are Data2D, and hyperspectral (or other) are DataND
DataDistribution: Enum for the distribution type of the data object. Data can be stored on linear grid (think about an oscilloscope trace having a fixed time interval, or camera having a regular grid of pixels) or stored on non uniform and non linear “positions”, for instance data taken at random time intervals. Data can therefore have two distributions: uniform or spread.
DataSource: Enum informing about the source of the data object, for instance raw from a detector or processed from mathematical functions (from ROI, …)
Detector: Any instrument generating data to be recorded
dte: Short name for DataToExport object
dwa: Short name for DataWithAxes object
Module: A module in the python sense is an importable object either a directory containing an __init__.py file or a python file containing data, functions or classes.

Note

If there is code that can be executed within your module but you don’t want it to be executed when importing, make sure to protect the execution using a : if __name__ == '__main__': clause.

Navigation: See signal.
pip & PyPI: pip is the official Python package manager and the one that is used for the PyMoDAQ project. pip downloads Python packages that are stored in the PyPI (Python Package Index) servers.
Plugin: A plugin is a python package whose name is of the type: pymodaq_plugins_apluginname containing functionalities to be added to PyMoDAQ

Note

A plugin may contains added functionalities such as:

Classes to add a given instrument: allows a given instrument to be added programmatically in a Control Modules graphical interface
Instrument drivers located in a hardware folder: contains scripts/classes to ease communication with the instrument. Could be third party packages such as Pymeasure
PID models located in a models folder: scripts and classes defining the behaviour of a given PID loop including several actuators or detectors, see The PID Model
Extensions located in a extensions folder: scripts and classes allowing to build extensions on top of the DashBoard

Entry points python mechanism is used to let know PyMoDAQ of installed Instrument, PID models or extensions plugins.

Plugin Manager: The Plugin Manager is a module of PyMoDAQ that ease the installation of plugins. It implements a simple graphical interface for the user to easily manage the plugins that are installed in his environment. The Plugin Manager uses a parser on the PyPI forge to propose any Python packages whose name starts by pymodaq_plugins_….
Preset: XML file containing the number and type of control modules to be used for a given experiment. You can create, modify and load a preset from the Dashboard menu bar.
Signal: Signal and Navigation are terms taken from the hyperspy package vocabulary. They are useful when dealing with multidimensional data. Imagine data you obtained from a camera (256x1024 pixels) during a linear 1D scan of one actuator (100 steps). The final shape of the data would be (100, 256, 1024). The first dimension corresponds to a Navigation axis (the scan), and the rest to Signal axes (the real detector’s data). The corresponding data has a dimensionality of DataND and a representation of (100|256,1024).